Candidate under investigation

FRANCE – The right wing French presidential candidate François Fillon has been placed under formal investigation for misuse of public funds.

Fillon is alleged to have given his wife and children generous fake jobs funded by the taxpayer as parliamentary assistants.

He becomes the first major candidate to run for France’s highest office while under formal investigation for misusing state money.

Magistrates announced a string of charges on Tuesday, including misuse of public money, misuse of corporate assets and failing to declare his assets to a public watchdog.

The French weekly Le Canard Enchaîné broke the biggest political scandal of the French presidential campaign six weeks ago when it claimed Fillon paid his wife, Penelope, who is British, at least 680,000 euros of taxpayers’ money for a fake job as a parliamentary assistant spanning 15 years.

He was also suspected of giving two of his children similar fake jobs when he was a senator and they were still students.

It is not illegal to employ a family member as a parliamentary assistant in France, as long as the person is genuinely employed. Fillon has denied breaking the law.

The investigating judges’ move, which in the French justice system does not confirm wrongdoing but means investigators have serious grounds for pursuing the matter, increases the pressure on his troubled campaign.

Under French law, being put under formal investigation means there is “serious or consistent evidence” that points to probable involvement in a crime. It is a step toward a trial but investigations can be dropped without proceeding to court.

Fillon has refused to step down as a candidate. Polls show he could risk being knocked out in the first round vote in April, behind the far-right Front National’s Marine Le Pen, and the independent centrist Emmanuel Macron.

A one-time presidential favourite who once styled himself as a sleaze-free ‘Mr Clean’, Fillon had initially promised he would step down from the campaign if he was placed under formal investigation.

He said during the primary race that prospective presidents needed to be irreproachable and that ministers under formal investigation could not serve in his government “while dogged by suspicion”. - PNC sources